As Kathryn mentioned earlier, in a weird bit of cognitive dissonance Ed Whelan was attacked while being vindicated in today’s New York Times public editor column. His crime? Pointing out that the husband of Linda Greenhouse, The New York Times’ Supreme Court reporter, has been involved in cases she’s written about. Ed thought this conflict of interest should at the very least be disclosed. The cases relate to detention of enemy combatants.

It’s worth noting Greenhouse has had ethical problems in the past. Many people have complained about her vocal support of abortion rights while also covering Supreme Court cases related to abortion. Her extreme bias on that topic was evident after last year’s Supreme Court ruling upholding the ban on partial-birth abortion. My wife wrote about that here. (See how easy it is to disclose when a spouse is involved in something?) In fact, my wife has written about Greenhouse’s shoddy reporting, extreme bias and problematic journalistic ethics here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

What struck me most about Greenhouse’s problems as a reporter is not that her husband is involved in cases that she covers. It’s that Greenhouse has compromised herself in her public statements. After a particular speech she gave at Harvard, previous NYT public editor Byron Calame wrote:

The government, Ms. Greenhouse said on the NPR audio version of her speech, “had turned its energy and attention away from upholding the rule of law and toward creating law-free zones at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, Haditha, other places around the world, the U.S. Congress, whatever. And let’s not forget the sustained assault on women’s reproductive freedom and the hijacking of public policy by religious fundamentalism.” She later added, “I feel a growing obligation to reach out across the ridiculous actual barrier that we seem about to build on the Mexican border. . . .”

When Greenhouse took some heat for being so open about the biases that her conservative readers have long complained about, she said, well, I’ll let Calame explain it:

Ms. Greenhouse told me she considers her remarks at Harvard to be “statements of fact” — not opinion — that would be allowed to appear in a Times news article. She said the Times has not suggested that she avoid writing stories on any of the topics on which she commented in June. “Any such limits would be completely preposterous,” she said.

It’s not surprising Greenhouse can’t determine she has conflicts of interest here — she can’t even distinguish between opinions and facts.